Inmates stay, you pay

In Sunday’s paper, my colleague James M. Odato looked at why the state spends millions annually to house inmates who are illegal aliens and eligible for deportation.

The inmates each cost the state an average of $62,000 per year.

According to Odato’s article, the inmates are being turned down for release by a state Board of Parole that often rejects the paroles for vague or unclear reasons.

From Odato’s story:

Henry is one of 281 non-citizen prisoners in the state’s heavily guarded lockups who have been seen by the Parole Board and denied release even though they have permanent orders of deportation issued against them. Most are in for violent crimes. But according to Parole Board policy arranged administratively in 2004, nonviolent felons like Henry can be turned over to ICE after serving half of the minimum term of their sentence. Last year, the Parole Board considered 77 eligible for release and let ICE take control of 60 of these non-violent felons.

However, many more could have been escorted out the door if the board adopted Executive Law. It says non-violent alien prisoners can be deported as soon as they come into the prison system.

Violent felons are eligible for release once they serve their minimum sentence. While federal immigration officials are eager to remove these felons, ICE can’t begin removal proceedings and assume the cost of that detainee until they are handed over. “Why aren’t they releasing them to ICE? I don’t have an answer to that,” said Ross Feinstein, an ICE spokesman.